About Varda Low Earth orbit is open for business. Varda is accelerating the development of commercial space infrastructure, from in-orbit pharmaceutical processing to reliable and economical reentry capsules. Varda’s W-Series vehicles are built, designed, and operated by Varda in-house, including the pharmaceutical processing payloads, the capsules, the C-PICA heat shields, and the satellite buses.

From life-saving pharmaceuticals to more powerful fiber optics, there is a world of products used on Earth today that can only be manufactured in space. Varda is accelerating innovation in the orbital economy by creating both the products and infrastructure needed so space can directly benefit life on Earth. Our mission is to expand the economic bounds of humankind.

Our team is uniquely suited to accomplishing this goal, with leadership and staff comprised of veterans from SpaceX, Blue Origin, major pharmaceutical companies and Silicon Valley. Varda was founded in January 2021 by Will Bruey and Delian Asparouhov with significant backing from world class investors including Khosla Ventures, Lux Capital, Founders Fund, Caffeinated Capital, General Catalyst, and Also Capital. Varda is headquartered in El Segundo, California, where we have offices and a production facility where our vehicles, equipment, and materials are built, integrated, and tested.

Varda also has offices in Washington, DC and Huntsville, AL. Join Varda, and work to create a bustling in-space ecosystem.

About This Role

As an Avionics Hardware Development Engineer at Varda, you will design, manufacture, test, and represent electrical components used to fly and manufacture products in space. In this role you will have immense ownership of hardware through all lifecycle phases. Get excited to deliver and test products that will go to space and back!

Some people say that you only have one chance to fly to space so you must be certain it will work. At Varda, we believe that the trip to space and back is the easiest trip our hardware takes. We stress our components above and beyond the levels it should expect to see in flight, and we investigate our failures thoroughly.

Come join our team and build quality electronics that you love to see fly over and over again.

Responsibilities

Develop mixed-signal designs and shepherd them through the full product lifecycle including

Requirements

definition, design, development, qualification, and release to production. Support avionics architecture trade studies, analyses, performance characterization and specification, device selection, and roadmap direction. Support risk analyses, design for test/manufacture/cost, and root-cause analysis of test discrepancies.

Design electrical circuit boards. Collaborate on mechanical design fit, form, and function. Functionally test your hardware through thermal, vibe, shock, TVAC, and EMI.

Write vehicle level integration test plans to validate for flight. Perform root cause analysis for test failures and develop mitigation strategies for flight risks. Example of Avionics Products you'll be working on: flight computers, networking, star trackers, reaction wheels, magnetorquers, payload controllers, battery packs, solar charger, RF transceiver and decoder.

Qualifications

S. in Electrical or Computer Engineer or related field. 3+ years of direct experience in electronics hardware development.

Demonstrated experience developing electrical circuit boards and delivering a working product. Strong sense of ownership and responsibility for components you contribute towards. Strong hands-on experience with oscilloscopes, function generators, benchtop digital multimeters, and power supplies.

Understanding of analog/digital filtering, mixed-signal circuit design, analysis, and test. Knowledge of signal integrity, power, grounding, and general board layout principles. Experience programming in Python, MATLAB, or another scripting/data analysis language.